Cross River: Audacity of vision

As yours sincerely set out for Calabar, the Cross River State capital last week, the mood was one of high expectations. If my earlier visit in June 2013 – set in the background of the anniversary of the loss of the state’s derivation revenue exactly a year earlier – was one of tempered expectations, this was to be entirely different. Shortly before that 2013 visit, I could not but recall that the state’s last derivation cheque in the sum of N345 million came exactly a year before the visit – the aftermath of the July 2012 apex court ruling terminating its membership of the oil-producing club. That was subsequent to the ceding of its entire 176 oil-wells to its neighbour, Akwa Ibom. While that particular development came as dampener to any serious expectation, the visit turned out to be most revealing – or rather a most rewarding one. In the end, I could only surmise that while the state may have lost those prized oil wells, it has demonstrated that it had a lot going for it in the iron-clad determination of its leadership to turn things around in quick time.

Of course, the main highlight of that visit was the ground-breaking ceremony of General Electric’s $1 billion manufacturing and training facility at Calabar, said to be one of two of its kind under the corporation’s Greenfield investment drive. But then, it was also an opportunity for the officials to showcase the impressive strides recorded in the area of direct foreign investment through the activities of the one-stop shop – the State Investment Promotion Bureau. Top on the list of the gains was Wilmar Limited’s $400 million investment in agriculture and agro-processing – which unfortunately I could not visit on that occasion. There was also the Brentex Petroleum $300 million pipe mills manufacturing; the $700 million Essar Power Limited 660MW Integrated Power Project; Southgate Cocoa, and the Artee Group’s investment in shopping malls –more than mere proofs of a state determined to move against the tide.

You can therefore understand the basis of my heightened expectations as I flew into the state capital, last week. In a sense, it was for me an opportunity to play catch-up on the earlier visit. Today, I can confirm that what whereas the state may have lost something in excess of N20 billion in the more than 22 months of non-receipt of derivation funds, it is, presently, not only fully poised to recover them through the burst of entrepreneurial energy to be unleashed from the massive investment in infrastructure and human capital, it appears even more determined to push new frontiers of development.

This is no exaggeration; whether one is talking of tourism, sports infrastructure, urban renewal, agriculture rural development, education (particularly vocational education) or, health, the sense of urgency in the mission by the Imoke administration to lay the foundation for a prosperous, sustainable future is discernable.

In Calabar, it was sheer marvel to behold the world-class Calabar International Convention Centre springing up, next to the Tinapa complex –both set within the sprawling Summit Hills – an integrated lifestyle real estate development complex. If ever a project would claim to speak to the determination of the state to become a force in global tourism, this would be it. And for Tinapa, it would be a case of the dream coming into realisation whenever it finally comes through; after all, nothing better speaks to the imperative to address the challenge which had rendered the utilisation of the multi-million dollar Tinapa investment sub-optimal than the coming of the 5,000-seat capacity auditorium, to be linked with it by mono rail. At completion, the centre would also host a 200-bed Convention Hotel under the state’s Public Private Partnership model; to complement these is the New Calabar Golf Course.

Also in Calabar, the U.J Esuene Stadium is beginning to wear a new look under the massive rehabilitation going on; we saw the NYSC Demonstration Secondary School – one of the prototype schools conceived under the Cross River standard – a model of what a learning environment should be – with libraries, laboratories, ICT facilities and modern conveniences. At the newly built Institute of Technology and Management, Ugep, in Yakurr Local Government, we saw evidence of a state determined to change both the face and the paradigm of vocational education.

In the area of road infrastructure, we drove through the newly built airport road bypass; the hundreds of kilometres of rural and urban roads, stretching from Calabar to Ikom, to Ogoja right up to Obudu – the ranch town; along the way, we inspected water and stadium projects in Ogoja and Ikom. Throughout the entire journey, we observed a deliberate effort to redress the neglect of the rural areas; so also is the effort to maintain the delicate balance between man and environment.

For me, two projects particularly stand out as deserving of mention. The Songhai farm complex in Abi; the other, the multi-million dollar Wilmar farm complex in Akampa. The former, a demonstration farm promoted by the state government to train the youths, is an integrated system under which waste products from plants, birds, fish ponds, which are ordinarily disposed off, are recycled as inputs. Earlier on, I had mentioned the huge agricultural complex owned by Wilmar, a multinational company. Both, aside showcasing the immense possibilities in commercial agriculture, offer immense promises in skills transfer for the youths of the state but also in the area of agro-processing.

Let me conclude by summarising the lessons I learnt in the course of the tour. The first is the power of vision. I guess it makes all the difference that the state strives “To become the leading Nigerian state with prosperous, healthy and well educated citizens living in harmony with people and Nature; and pursuing legitimate interest in freedom moderated by good governance”.

I consider that a clear, powerful statement to run with.

The second lesson is the importance of continuity. Here, it is so easy to draw upon the lesson of Tinapa which is that the project, as well conceived as it appears, could never have come to its own without the Calabar International Convention facility. By picking up from where his predecessor stopped, Governor Imoke simply gave life to what is potentially, another white-elephant project. The good people of the state would, in years to come, have Imoke and his team to thank for this.

Finally, I guess the point cannot be sufficiently made about how dysfunctional our practice of federalism has become. Asked about the terrible states of federal roads in the states at the Town Hall meet, the governor couldn’t agree more with the view that the notion of federal road in state jurisdiction is a strange.

I should add that the National Assembly consider turning over the budgetary allocation for maintaining federal roads to the states. From what I saw of the quality of Cross River roads, I have no doubt that the state could deliver a far better job than the federal maintenance agency could ever.